Netflix is making one of its originals free for anyone to stream

Netflix is doing something a bit unusual: making one of its original movies free for anyone to stream. Yes, that includes people who don’t subscribe to the service, but there is a catch. You’ll only be able to watch the movie without a subscription until March 9, after which point it will revert back to being a subscriber-only offering. The change comes in time for Valentine’s Day.

The free offering, which is essentially a form of advertising the service by luring in people who have resisted signing up, is the Netflix Original movie To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before. The movie is live on the service now and can be accessed here even if you don’t have an account. You can view the movie’s trailer in the second half of the tweeted video below:

Love is in the air! To celebrate, To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before is available for anyone without a Netflix account to watch through March 9! pic.twitter.com/mLuHcxlvh7

As the title suggests, To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before is a teen romance movie firmly wedged in the comedy genre. The show stars Lana Condor and Noah Centineo in the leading roles. The movie was released on the platform in 2018, so why the renewed attention?

Netflix is about to release To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before 2, a sequel to this original flick. It makes sense to make the first movie available for free — Valentine’s Day is coming, the new movie is coming, and the company isn’t really missing out on much by temporarily making the title free to people who may then sign up in order to watch the sequel.

Though this seems to be the first time Netflix has made an original available for free in the United States, it has tested similar promotions in other countries, including with The Crown‘s third season in the UK. Only time will tell whether Netflix embraces this strategy as a regular promotion in the future, however.